


A Determined Girl

by MirandaMaybe



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-16
Updated: 2012-10-16
Packaged: 2017-11-16 11:38:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,791
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/539028
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MirandaMaybe/pseuds/MirandaMaybe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU in which Willas Tyrell was fostered at Winterfell and his betrothal to Sansa is looming - but she wants more than an arranged marriage.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Determined Girl

**Author's Note:**

> AU: Willas was fostered at Winterfell and meant to marry Sansa (so Joffrey couldn't muck everything up HURRAH) and I just REALLY LIKE fluffy autumny ficlets

Sansa could feel the chill in the air as soon as she woke, pushing off the thinner (but only by comparison) blankets and hastening to the tall window to see if her suspicions were correct. The courtyard below was filled with activity – heavier furs brought out from storage, more durable shutters being nailed on to the sills and the storerooms being readied for the first time after this long summer: autumn had finally arrived, the brief few weeks before winter hit Westeros.

Quickly wrapped in a dark green gown Sansa rushed down to breakfast, to find that Robb, Willas and Jon were already tearing into the dishes of food – winter food! Glorious warm bread and thick porridge smothered in Northern honey, hot milk mixed with ground nuts: all the things that Sansa had longed for through the tepid summer months of cold foods. She practically flung herself down on the bench with them, ladling the porridge into her bowl and shovelling it up into her mouth in a manner that would have made her wrinkle her nose, had she been watching another girl do it. But the excitement of the day made her uncaring of her behaviour, and feeling as free as any of the others.

Willas looked at her, clearly surprised and confused at this Sansa who was completely different to the one who had bid him goodnight just hours ago.

“She really likes winter.” Robb said, grabbing the last sausage before Jon could add it to the pile on his plate.

“Don’t know why, it’s miserable.” Jon added, nicking Willas’ unattended bacon to make up for the sudden protein deficiency.

Sansa glared at them from behind another large spoonful of porridge, choosing the food over arguing with her brothers right now – although she did flick the dark bread crust at Jon’s head, allowing Willas to steal back his bacon.

“Anyway,” Robb said, thwacking Jon across the back of his head before he tried to revenge the missing rasher “we’re going to ride out beyond the copse today to see that the villages over there are preparing, so we need to leave soon. Tell mother we’ll be back before dinner, Sansa.”

“Tell Rickon to, I’m coming with you.”

“What?!”

“It’s nearly winter, Robb. Why wouldn’t I?” She smiled sweetly, kicking him before he could offer any argument “if you don’t want to ride with me, I’m sure Willas will – won’t you?” she turned her face to him, and took the stammers and blushing as an acceptance. “Wonderful. I’ll meet you three in the courtyard in a moment – but don’t keep me waiting.” Her voice switched from sweetness and light to the whip-crack command of an experienced older sister on the last phrase, making the boys jump and hurry to ready themselves despite their superiority in age.

 

* * *

 

 

She and Willas led the little deputation out of the walls, cloaks billowing as they sped up, easily the most expert riders of the group. She had been deeply afraid of horses at first, but when he arrived at Winterfell he had taken it upon himself to teach her – not on the swift, highly strung horses of the south that he had himself grown up with, but on stocky northern mounts. They were not famed for their speed, unlike the steeds of Highgarden, but the power in their thick legs and the durability in their stock were far more valuable above the Neck, and both children grew to appreciate them above any other breed of horse. Robb and Jon did not even try to catch them, knowing that they would circle back when the rush of the speed and wind had ceased to become a novelty.

“D’you see what she’s doing there?” Jon asked quietly, not wanting his voice to carry over the empty moor “That girl has grown more crafty than we give her credit for.”

Robb whistled through his teeth as understanding dawned. “Of course.”  He said, watching Sansa admiringly as she wheeled her horse in a circle around Willas’ “the betrothal is on the first day of winter. Willas doesn’t have a chance, poor bastard.”

“Well if Sansa’s set on seducing him we’d better not give them too much space. She’s determined when she wants something.”

“We learnt that when you refused to let her have that banner for her room. It took weeks for your hair to turn back to a normal colour.”

Jon kicked out at Robb, both of them laughing, and they spurred the horses onwards.

 

* * *

 

 

Her brothers were right: when Sansa wanted something, she wasn’t about to let minor details get in her way, and she very much wanted Willas to fall in love with her before they were officially betrothed. Always ambitious – and this characteristic was hardly unsupported in a family full of friendly competition – she’d long ago decided that she could wait until autumn to start. Now that they were half way through the season, her campaign was earnestly pressing forward. She found every excuse to be with Willas – watching him practice in the training yard, sitting closer than was truly proper at meals (earning frowns from her mother but chuckles from her father, as he realised her game.) and after just one day she had persuaded him to sit and read with her in the evenings – talking about the legends by the dying fire until the sky darkened and began to grow light again.

She counted every blush as a victory, watched the way his muscles played under the skin of his arm when she touched him and noted every time that his eyes followed her across the room, every time he stopped and just watched her through a doorway, every time he drew aside in the hallway and let her pass with longing written clearly on his face.

But no matter what, she still couldn’t drive him to _talk_ to her about what he felt, what he wanted, what he meant with the lingering kisses on her hand and the looks that made her bubble inside, as though her stomach was boiling up and engulfing her body. So it came to pass that she cornered him, in the library. Sitting on the wide window cushion with her legs drawn up, she bid him sit and looked at him with great, sad eyes.

“Willas, I fear that I have given you cause to be angry with me.” She began, taking a guilty pleasure in the surprise that shot through his expression, and the speed with which he rushed to dissuade her of this idea.

“No! No, Sansa, not at all, and I’m sorry if I have-“

“Well then why are you so cold to me?!” She exclaimed, pulling him down to sit with her and leaning close to him “whenever we are together you find some excuse to leave! You never finish conversations with me, you seem afraid to look me in the eye most times – is there something about me that repels you?!”

“No-no!”

“Then why, Willas? Because you’ve hurt me, really. I don’t understand.”

“Sansa – you don’t repel me.” He said quietly, looking directly at her with all the honesty he possessed “I feel much for you, and none of it is repulsion. The reason that I have kept myself further from you these past weeks is that…I am afraid of scaring you. Of offending your honour.”

“My honour could stand much if you would just be frank with me!” she said, exasperated “Willas – what do you mean? I am in no mood for edging around our true meanings.”

“Fine!” He stood quickly, pacing over to the other window as if in thought, but wheeling back around to face her almost instantly. “Sansa, I like you, you know that well-“

She began to speak, to deny this, to quote is behaviour at him but his next words silenced her completely.

“But I’m also in love with you. I have been for years.”

She stared at him, jaw hanging loose. Sansa certainly hadn’t expected _that_ much honesty when she planned this part of her attack. Willas stood very still, hair all in disarray from raking his fingers through it, shoulders slumped and his dear face an awful mix of hope and desperation.

“You could say something.” He said, almost croaking with nervousness.

“I…” Sansa could barely speak herself – she felt as though all the air had been knocked out of her lungs, like she’s been thrown from a horse. “I think I love you too.”

Neither could tell you how it happened – nor would be willing to – but in an instant they were kissing, pressed against the wall with all the sudden intensity of first love, confessing all that they had hidden from the other for far too long.

Unfortunately, they were soon interrupted.

“Told you.” Jon muttered to Robb, taking in the rumpled, blushing pair from the doorway.

“We’d better tell Father.”

“Tell me what – oh.”

The three Stark men stood there, the same bemused expression slowly turning to the same mischievous grin when confronted with the deeply embarrassed teenagers.

“I think you should go and sit with your mother for a while, Sansa.” Ned said, his laugh barely hidden under the advice. She fled, face flaming but limbs singing with happiness and surprise and the strange invincibility that she had begun to feel with Willas’ confession.

When she had gone out of earshot, Ned cuffed Willas around the head affectionately. “Looks like we’re going to have to marry you two sooner rather than later then.”

 

* * *

 

 

In the end, the wedding ended up being a scant month after the betrothal, since the happy couple managed to get themselves discovered at least once a week: in the glass gardens, hidden in the godswood, behind the haystack in the stables. Catelyn set Bran and Arya to find them, since those two knew the castle better than any, but often the direwolves seemed to be on Sansa’s side, and led them astray, so she suspected that they had got away with far more meetings than she had interrupted. Still, Sansa assured her that she hadn’t done anything to be ashamed of (and in her mind she often cheekily added to her mother that she couldn’t possibly feel ashamed of something so lovely – but Sansa had a healthy respect for her own life, and so she kept that addition firmly inside her head.) and certainly, they were discreet to a degree (though again, the servants were certainly on their side) so no fault could be found after a while.

And everyone agreed that when they stood under the heart tree, with the first snowfall of winter frosting their hair like silver, they looked happier than anyone truly had a right to on their wedding day.


End file.
